Of Quests and Kings

by Robert Adams

  "Brian told me, back there, that he is ready for us to make use of FitzRobert, that immediately the new order is jelled here, you are to journey back to him at Lagore with word and the Jewel."

  "But I want you to do more than that, Ugo. I will send you back to Lagore right enough, bearing with you all that Brian requires; however, I will be sending Roberto with you. I want the two of you to wangle a way to accompany this condottiere inglese on the northern campaign and thoroughly observe, which should present you no difficulty, for the Ard-Righ seems quite impressed by you and most friendly toward you personally."

  "My own affairs aside, for the nonce, you're a younger son, aren't you, Ugo?"

  Sir Ugo nodded, with a wry half-smile. "Yes, Your Grace, one of several—my family is quite a large one—and with little to no chance of inheriting anything, barring some calamity. This is why my early acceptance by the Military Order of Rome was considered to be such a stroke of good fortune, and when I then was chosen, picked out of a number of young knights, to be a member of the staff and household of His Eminence d'Este, it was felt that my living was assured for life."

  Di Bolgia nodded his head briskly. "And so it might have been, still could be, for that matter. But Ugo, consider, please, victory or defeat are sides of the same coin and each has an equal chance of turning up. Should d'Este or Sicola or even Ermannus be elected, then, yes, your fortune is made, your preferment guaranteed . . . for so long as he lives and his faction remains paramount in Rome."

  "However, Ugo, having now been openly and thoroughly identified with the household of d'Este and, through that association, with the Italian Faction, if he and they lose this unholy war and Moor or a Spaniard is elected, then your life would not be worth a pinch of chicken shit within Italy, anywhere in Italy."

  "Therefore, I would sincerely advise you to cultivate the Ard-Righ. No, wait, Ugo, don't say anything until I'm done. I'm not counseling that you turn your coat on d'Este—you wouldn't do such even if I did so counsel you, you're not that stripe of man, you're loyal and very honorable. No, all that I am saying is to consider that your true fortune and personal interest just might not lie in Italy, but here, in these more northerly climes, and since you do not now and most likely never will hold Italian lands, then why should you return if you find your prospects better elsewhere? With but a little effort on your part, I think that you can feel secure in the support of a most powerful patron: this Brian is a driven man, and I think that, ere long, he will be truly Ard-Righ—King of all Ireland in all ways."

  "Now, back to my own interests, Ugo. While Roberto studies the troops and the military side of the northern campaign, I want you to learn every bit that you can about the person and character of this Duca di Norfolk, as well as those of his principal lieutenants. While so doing, bear this thought of mine in mind: According to Brian, all of di Norfolk's land force are cavalry—mostly, heavy-armed horse, with a few Kalmyks as light horse. Now, all of my own condotta are foot; only a troop or so worth of heavy-armed axemen and officers are usually mounted. I am of the opinion that despite his denials, the Ard-Righ will see his grand design come more quickly to fruition does he have two, rather than just the one, present army, and I cannot conceive of a better army for him than my condotta combined with a really first-rate condotta of effective cavalry."

  "I think that this was what His Eminence d'Este had in mind, but he chose ill in the matter of these Afriqans. They're good enough soldiers, but they just cannot seem to adjust, adapt to this climate: at any given time, a quarter to a full half of the poor buggers are suffering of a bloody flux of the lungs, it would seem. This is bad enough in a permanent garrison on the most southerly coast, here, but can you imagine just how few of them would be effective were they to be marched up into the harsher climes of the north. It would be quite impossible. So, no, am I to combine and provide Brian with what he really needs, it must be with horsemen already acclimated to Irland, and so I need to know all that I can of this di Norfolk as soon as is possible, Ugo."

  Hurriedly glancing about to be certain that no one was close by, Sir Ugo asked in a hushed voice, "How does Your Grace plan the . . . ahhh . . . demise?"

  Di Bolgia shrugged his massively thewed shoulders. "Probably, just let the individual die happy, a death in battle, what he would do doubt describe as an 'honorable death.' That way, I need do nothing myself save allow the reins to slip a bit in my fingers. The troops of him I spoke with back there will do the rest."

  "It sounds a reasonable plan, Your Grace, but how are you going to keep FitzRobert from riding out with him? Despite his good points, the man seems to be overly full of a suicidal degree of clan loyalty."

  The answer was another shrug. "With cudgel across the pate, if it comes to the sticking point, Ugo, or mayhap a bit of poppy paste. I've worked too long and too hard to render that shaggy savage into the likeness of a civilized gentleman to see him just go down to dust with the rest of the addle-pated FitzGeralds."

  "With di Rezzi now become his late grace," said Sir Ugo, "there exists little to prevent quicker and more expeditious method of ridding Munster of him, Your Grace . . . so long as a certain degree of circumspection is exercised, of course."

  Timoteo grinned. "You truly own hidden depths, Ugo, my lad. Of what were you thinking—poison, garrote, sharp steel? Or mayhap a means less easily detectable, eh? But, no, I think that this plan of mine will be best. Besides, I've already told the man I spoke with back there in Laigin that that was how it would be done."

  But in the first meeting of the Royal Council, Timoteo called on the next day after his return from his surreptitious parley with the Ard-Righ, Righ Tamhas proceeded to drop a bombshell.

  Resting one elbow upon the tabletop and pulling at a lock of his greasy, matted hair with bejeweled and grubby fingers, Tamhas FitzGerald said, "No, I've reconsidered, gentlemen. The righteous wrath of a Ri and Righ should not be, will not be, wasted upon such scum as that dog-vomit Ard-Righ Brian chose to leave behind to hold his set of ditches. They are all certainly cowards, else they would have long since called me and us all to come out and fight them breast to breast as men should, not just squatted out of sight for much of the time, now and then shooting off a gonne or engine—cowards' weapons, both of them."

  "Yes, Sir Timoteo," he said solemnly to the condottiere, who on hearing his words had first paled, then become almost livid of face, his big hands clenched until the craggy knuckles shone white as snow against the weathered, hairy skin, "this Ard-Righ's contumely is indeed cause for anger, but it were better to husband both ire and strength to wreak upon him and his better, braver troops whenever they return to Munster. We have spoken."

  That afternoon, the Righ—as he so often did—drank too much with his meal to allow of his legs operating properly. Four of the FitzGerald Guards, none too steady themselves, bore him almost to the top of the stone stairs before he and they all tumbled back down them, breaking one guard's leg and another's neck in the process. Servants, cold-sobered men, took over at that point and bore the still-singing Righ up to his bedchamber, undressed him, and put him to bed, seemingly none the worse for wear. But when some of his gentleman-cousins went in to awaken him the next morning, it was to find him stiff and dead, the body unmarked save for a lump standing up from his pate and a trickle of dried blood that had issued from the hairy depths of one ear.

  "God be praised that that hard-nosed old bastard di Rezzi is gone to God and not back here in Munster," Timoteo said vehemently to the emergency meeting of the Royal Council. "Else he'd be railing at us all and accusing us publicly of foulest regicide."

  Le Chevalier let his gaze wander around the table with its two empty chairs—Sean FitzRobert had not been asked to this particular session—then asked blandly, "And is, or are, one or more of us guilty of that crime, Your Grace?"

  Il Duce di Bolgia snorted. "Of course not, Marc! Everyone here, you and half the residents of this palace complex, saw what happened yesterday. The royal ass got too tight a ski
n to walk and those damned cousins of his were in not much better shape, so the pack of them fell the length of a score and a half of steep granite stairs. One man was killed outright, on the spot, one is likely crippled for life, and the late royal sot was just hurt worse than he, in his drunken stupor, thought he was. The royal physician who pawed and probed the royal corpse states that the royal skull was cracked."

  "Even so," le Chevalier pressed on, "there are more things than a flight of stairs are capable of cracking a skull, even a royal one . . . perhaps, in this case especially, a royal one."

  "Now just one damned minute, Sir Marc." Roberto di Bolgia came up half out of his chair, his face red and his right hand grasping the wire-wound hilt of a sheathed dagger at his belt.

  Sir Ugo chose that moment to arise and say in a loud, firm voice, "Gentlemen, if you please. You're behaving less like polished and well-bred noblemen of France and Italy than you are like these savage, dirty, scabby, brawling FitzGeralds, did you know that?"

  "Your Grace, please to resume your seat and your composure."

  "Roberto, sit down. If you try to put that blade into Marc, I'll be forced to put one of mine own into you."

  "Marc, if you don't or can't believe that His Grace and Roberto and I had nothing to do with Righ Tamhas' death, then take your ship of the line and sail back to France, to Sicily, or to hell, for all I care, but please cease your senseless questionings and baitings. Just what is it you're after this morning, anyway? Will you answer me that?"

  When all were once more seated, le Chevalier looked from beneath his brows at Sir Ugo, grumbling, "It . . . it's all just happened in too damned convenient a fashion here. I knew that the removal of Roi Tamhas was necessary, and I was willing to go along with letting him ride out there and get his head blown off, for it was truly an honorable death by any standards save your decadent Italian ones. But to coldly murder a king is a something I cannot . . . could not stomach, especially when said king is ostensibly your employer, trusts you, depends upon you. I'm sorry, I had until this morning considered myself to be a man of the modern world, but now I know my true nature: I am just an old-fashioned, honorable Norman knight, who values truth and loyalty to his God-given overlords above all earthly things."

  "Had I that right, I would indeed board the Impressionant and set sail for France, for Le Havre, and on this very day. But I cannot, in honor, for I promised my king that I would stay with his ship; that ship still is pledged to the service of Rome and His Eminence d'Este, so remain here I must. However, in light of words spoken this morning here, and in light of what might or might not have been done to speed Roi Tamhas to Heaven, I must respectfully withdraw from the Royal Council of the Kingdom of Munster."

  "Now, by Pontius Pilate's putrid pecker," roared Timoteo, "we've told you we none of us killed that dim-witted, ever-sodden yokel of a king, Marc! What more do you require of us? Solemn oaths?"

  Shrewdly guessing that that was just what would impress the Norman and retain him on the council, Sir Ugo drew the royal sword of state from where it rested before the late king's empty canopied chair.

  "All right. Marc, Righ Tamhas always attested that the pommel of this brand contained a finger bone of St. Columbia." Clasping both hands about the oversized pommel, he said slowly, "I, Sir Ugo Mario Vittorio d'Orsini, do solemnly swear upon this holy relic and upon my hope of salvation that I in no way brought about or caused others to bring about the demise of the late Tamhas FitzGerald, Ri of that ilk and Righ of Munster."

  * * * *

  The FitzGeralds all were forced to come to the city by way of the river, due to the blocking of all the landward approaches by the Ard-Righ's siege lines, which gave each and everyone one of them a good look at the impressive ships, all bristling with cannons, moored out in the channel of the river. Within the city itself, they quickly were made aware that the only troops of any number were those of the Italian and Afriqan mercenaries and that said mercenaries would favor the elevation of no one of the claimants to the throne save Sir Sean FitzRobert. Therefore, having care for their heads and wishing to get out of the city with them still in place, as well as admitting to each other both publicly and privately that Sean FitzRobert had about as good a claim to the throne and the chieftaincy as any of his peers, they announced after only a week of feasting, drinking, shouting, snarling, insulting, brawling, and bloodshed that their choice for Ri and Righ was Sean FitzRobert, who would be crowned as soon as Tamhas FitzGerald had been buried properly.

  Timoteo did not wait for the coronation. While almost everyone else was at the funeral service—sanctified, in the absence of a resident prelate, by a bishop brought in from Chaisil—and the burial, he and Roberto and Sir Ugo thoroughly intimidated, terrified, the royal treasurer and, with that functionary's trembling assistance, violated the strong-room, removed the Star of Munster, plus a little coined gold and a ring that took il Duce's fancy, and set Sir Ugo and Roberto on the way to Lagore before Tamhas' leaden casket was yet in its crypt. Le Chevalier had no part of this, indeed had no knowledge of its contemplation; he had been at the funeral mass and the encryptation of the deceased Righ of Munster, along with Ri and Righ-elect Sean FitzRobert.

  Of course, there was an almighty commotion when the royal treasurer was found in the strong-room with his throat cut and the Star of Munster missing from its chest, but Timoteo testily pointed out to Sean FitzRobert and a number of others that it was not and had never been the responsibility of him and the other mercenaries to provide internal security for the palace or even the town; such duties were and always had been the exclusive provinces of the FitzGerald Guards and the Corcaigh Guards. He added that if the king-to-be and the other FitzGerald cousins did not like the quality of his work, he would be just as happy to load all of his troops aboard ship and sail back to Italy and let them deal with the besiegers themselves. At that point, all accusations of malfeasance, misfeasance, and nonfeasance were stilled.

  CHAPTER 8

  Her Grace Dame Krystal, Duchess of Norfolk, Markgräfin von Velegrad, Countess of Rutland, the Baroness of Strathtyne, was summoned to the presence of His Grace Harold, Archbishop of York, then escorted to him by four of his halberdiers. The way was long, down the stairs from her suites in the north wing of the archepiscopal country palace, along the corridors to the main palace, then up more stairs to the archbishop's own suite. And at the guarded doors to that suite her ladies were courteously denied entrance, so that Her Grace was already in a fighting mood when the doors closed firmly behind her.

  "What the fuck is this horseshit all about, anyway, Hal?" she snarled at the frail man seated across the room, near the bright rays of sunshine pouring through a window.

  "We need to talk, Krystal," said the old man.

  "Fine!" she snapped. "Let my ladies in and I'll talk your goddam ears off."

  He shook his head. "No, Krystal, I have not long that I can remain out here, I must soon return to York. I want to talk to you without the constant titterings and hushed whisperings of that gaggle of noble-born geese you have collected about you."

  "Krystal, there are those of us who are very worried about you. You have changed very drastically in a very short time . . . and not for the better, I must say."

  "Krystal, before Bass left for the King's business in Ireland, he charged me with a certain responsibility, and the time is come for me to discharge it. On the basis of the things you have written in your letters to him, as well as on the basis of things he has heard from others concerning you, he feels that it would be much better for the sake of the boy and for you, too, were little Joe to begin his fosterage early."

  She wrinkled her brow. "Fosterage? What the hell is that?"

  "All gentle-born boys go through some years of living with another noble family than their own, sometimes a distant relative, other times not. Bass has secured a fosterage with an old and highly respected noble family: they already have three boys in fosterage and—" The archbishop broke off in shock at the appearance of the wo
man. She was become livid of face, tiny specks of froth had appeared at the corners of her mouth, and her eyes resembled more those of some wild beast than anything human.

  "In a pig's asshole!" she shrieked, reverting suddenly back to twentieth-century English. "Not you or that fucking cocksucker I'm married to or anybody else is going to take my Joe away from me, do you hear me, you old motherfucker? I am the Duchess of Norfolk, and what I say goes, get that through your thick head! For two fucking cents, I'd call Sir Conn this minute and have him show you what . . ."

  While the woman raged on, the archbishop, looking as if he bore the full weight of the world upon his frail shoulders, gave a pull to a bell rope. Rupen Ademian and three short but husky-looking women clothed in the habits of nuns entered from another room. It was a battle-royal, there in the little private parlor, and the nursing sisters and the furnishings all suffered for it, and at last Rupen put an end to it by cold-cocking the duchess and she was bound and easily borne away by the three women.

  At a nod from the old man Rupen opened the doors to the foyer of the suite and signaled the halberdiers to admit the seven agitated ladies of Krystal's household to the thoroughly wrecked parlor.

  Seemingly oblivious of the chaos of splintered furnishings, stained carpet, and smashed bric-a-brac amongst which he sat, the old archbishop said mildly, but in a tone that brooked no argument or questioning, authority implicit in his every soft word, "Ladies, even as I speak here, there are those above-stairs who are packing the clothing and effects of the Duke of Norfolk's little son, in preparation for his imminent departure to a fosterage in Sussex. Without him to care for, Her Grace of Norfolk has entered a cloister for an indeterminate period of contemplation and a life of simplicity and prayer. All of her possessions are to be packed by you, and then servants will move them to a place of safe storage until she again is ready to enter the world of man. Sir Rupen Ademian here will be at your call should you need any assistance."